


Teddy Bear

by CrazyBeCat



Series: Writer Bingo Challenge Two [1]
Category: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mirandy Year of Fun & Frolics, Sad, Writer Bingo, established Mirandy, wardrobe malfunction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 17:50:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14218476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrazyBeCat/pseuds/CrazyBeCat
Summary: Andy gets knocked over and has a wardrobe problem.Nigel catches sight of a tattoo and wants to know about it.





	Teddy Bear

**Author's Note:**

> LOOK LOOK! ANOTHER ONE!  
> This one is sad, and has reference to suicide. Please be gentle to yourselves and don't read it if that's a trigger for you. I love you and would prefer you to click the back button.  
> Written for Bingo Card Two: Wardrobe Malfunction. (Well for now at least, it may change... xD but probably not)  
> I didn't edit it very much, because it was actually starting to get a little Trigger-y for me. So pardon any errors and I'll read through it and fix it up a little later.  
> Lots of Love,  
> CBC

Andy felt herself falling, and flailed. Coffee flying behind her, Andy scrambled to catch hold of something to keep her body upright. She toppled, disjointed and gangly, against a table that was set up. Her shirt was hiked up nearly to her bra from her frantic arm movements, and her heel slipped from her foot, but she managed to at least not fall completely to the floor.

“Hey! Are you fucking serious! What the fuck did I do to you?” She shouted at the huffy model that had slammed into her. “You just made me spill Miranda’s coffee!” She added, taking pleasure in the horror-filled look the model gave her as the woman spun around.

“Yea, that’s right, not feeling so good now, huh?” Andy snarked, not even caring about her bad attitude. Miranda was going to be in a killer mood after learning about the spilled coffee and Andy was absolutely going to say that one of the models purposefully knocked into her. To think that so many models got so upset after learning Andy was dating the Fashion Queen, and acted as if knocking into her was going to make things better. Miranda was going to eviscerate her.

“Six, you alright?” Nigel asked, walking quickly to her side and putting a hand out to help her up.

“Thanks. Besides having to tell Miranda that her coffee was spilled all over the sidewalk, and just about flashing anyone who was watching, yea, just peachy.” She used Nigel’s arm to help heave herself up, and grumbled as she went about fixing her wayward clothes.

“Ooh, is that a little ink I spy there?” Nigel batted her hand out of the way to lift up the edge of her shirt again to point at a small little teddy bear. “My my, our little Andy has a tattoo, who would have thought. What’s it for?”

Andy rolled her eyes and pushed her shirt back down. “Yea, lots of people have tattoos. Is it really so shocking that I might have some?”

“Oh, it certainly is. And that doesn’t answer my question.”

“I got it after my sister died. She really loved teddy bears so I got one as a tattoo to remember her,” Andy said, shrugging as if it didn’t matter before turning and heading towards where she could see Miranda.

“You have a sister?” Nigel asked, moving to keep stride with her.

“Had, if you were listening. I had a sister. She died when I was sixteen. I was such a mess afterwards that when I went and asked my mom if I could get a tattoo she agreed, because it was the first time in months that I’d said anything.”

“How old was your sister? What happened?”

“Nigel, I love you, I do, but I am so not interested right now in talking about this, alright? I’m in a bad mood, I’m late to meet with Miranda, and I don’t have a coffee for her.”

Nigel put up a placating hand and nodded, “Ok, yea, alright. Another time?”

Andy sighed as they neared Miranda. “Yea, maybe another time.” She put on a partial smile as Miranda turned and looked at them. “Miranda, I was just bulldozed by a model so I don’t have your coffee. But if you want to skip out for a bit we can get some lunch and get you another one.”

Miranda’s gaze turned fiery as she took obvious stock of Andy’s body. “Are you hurt?”

“A little sore from catching a table with my ribcage, embarrassed from almost flashing everyone, and pissed off about dropping your coffee, but otherwise I’m ok.” Stepping forward Andy gave her girlfriend a very quick kiss. “I wouldn’t mind if you ripped into the bitch though. It was a very deliberate collision, and I’m sick of being some kind of punching bag over me dating you.”

Miranda’s lip curled into an angry snarl. “Nigel?”

“Yes, Miranda?”

“Did you see what happened?”

“Yes, Miranda. I know the model who knocked into her.”

“Good. Find her, and tell her I want to speak with her in an hour. Andrea and I are going to get a quick lunch, and a coffee that the model will be paying for to replace the one she ruined. Tell the photographer to do her shoots last, I need to speak with her first, and afterwards she may be leaving without getting her paycheck. You’re in charge until I return. Inform Emily. That’s all.”

Andy was grateful that Miranda took her hint about wanting to get the fuck away for a little bit, even though she’d only just gotten there. They could very well eat the food from the catering service, but Andy wanted some distance. “See you in a bit, Nigel. Good luck.”

She linked arms with her girlfriend as they walked off, resisting the urge to rest her temple against Miranda’s shoulder. Miranda was adverse to too much affection in public, and Andy didn’t want to make her uncomfortable. Andy couldn’t wait until they were at the townhouse so Andy could curl up with the other woman. Today was turning out to be a frustrating day.

As they gained distance from the shoot, Miranda asked softly, “Are you alright, Andrea, truly?”

Andy sighed. “Yea, just rattled. I was trying to catch my balance, and in my efforts my shirt rode up pretty far. Nigel caught sight of my tattoo.” She scoffed. “I got the damn tattoo in a place where it could be easily hidden so I didn’t get questions about it all the time, damn it. Never thought a wardrobe malfunction from getting slammed into and losing my balance would be the reason someone saw it.” She ranted, letting Miranda guide her wherever they were going, taking comfort in Miranda’s steady and calm presence. “And of course I’m little miss innocent, and he gasps in shock as it’s revealed I have a fucking tattoo. For fuck’s sake the world would die if they ever discovered the sacred Miranda Priestly has a tattoo.”

“I know, darling, I know.” Miranda murmured.

She swallowed against a growing lump in her throat. “Of course he means well, mostly, but he’s curious and he wants to know all about it, and I don’t fucking want to talk about it. I got it there so I don’t have it displayed all the time. I got there so it’s there for me. I got it there cause it was a painful place to get a tattoo so maybe I could feel an outside pain instead of the inside pain. I got it- damn it- I got it so I could feel anything besides the inside pain.”

“I know, my darling. You don’t have to tell Nigel anything you don’t want to. Just like you didn’t have to tell me anything until you were ready,” Miranda reassured, opening the door to the Starbucks and guiding Andy inside.

Andy sighed and gave a sad little smile. “Thanks. I’ll go order, would you find a table for us, please.”

“I’ll take a coffee and one of those protein boxes.”

Moving to stand in line, as Miranda grabbed the cleanest table she could find, Andy thought about what she wanted to tell Nigel, if she told him anything.

Maybe she’d invite him to the townhouse after the shoot, and tell him in the presence of Miranda, give herself some support.

Yeah, maybe she’d do that.  
____________________________________

Wearing a light tank top and some comfy designer sweats, Andy opened the door and waved Nigel in. “Miranda’s just pouring some wine in the kitchen, but we’ll be in the lounge.”

“I feel like I’m about to go in front of a firing squad,” Nigel joked as he took off his coat and hung it in the hall closet.

“No, it’s just that, my sister is a sensitive topic, and I asked Miranda if it was alright to talk about it where I feel comfortable,” Andy explained as she lead the way to the lounge, just in time for Miranda to enter from the kitchen with 3 glasses.

“Nigel. Wonderful work on the shoot. I’m hoping we won’t have to redo anything, so long as the photographer did his job,” Miranda commented as she handed him a glass, then another to Andy.

“I will keep my fingers crossed.” Nigel lifted in glass in a toast before he sat and took a sip. “Hmm. That’s a lovely choice.”

Andy and Miranda settled on the small couch, Andy curling up into Miranda’s side. “So, the tattoo. My sister was born six years before me. So she was twenty-two, when I was sixteen. Kennedy Raquel Sachs. She was my best friend. She was at college and I was in high school so I didn’t see her that often the last few years before she died. Right, well, she killed herself. Hung herself in her dorm room.”

“Oh my god, Andy.” Nigel set his glass down to lean forward and reach out to lay a hand against Andy’s leg.

“Yeah. Um. I’d just talked to her a few days before. She’d told me she was feeling sad, and asked me to go into her room and give her favorite of all favorite teddy bears a big hug, and to pretend it was her. So I did, I was holding the cordless phone to my ear and gave the bear the biggest hug, and I asked her if she could feel it. I was being silly, ya know, but if she was at home I would have given her the biggest hug I could have managed. She gave the best hugs when I was sad. Well, we got a call from the school dean a few days after. May twenty-eighth. She hadn’t gone to her classes, and one of her friends was concerned that nobody had heard from Kennedy about her being absent from class, so went over and had the campus security open the door. Anyway, it was too late.”

She felt Miranda wrap an arm around her, and felt Nigel squeeze at her knee. “Right. So, I barely managed to pass my final exams in June. I was going through the motions, completely catatonic. Didn’t say anything, barely ate anything. I honestly really don’t remember much, until one day in August I was curled up on her bed crying, holding that teddy bear, and I suddenly got up and went to my mom and told her I wanted a tattoo. My mom started crying. I hadn’t said anything to her since my sister had died. And she took me around to a few different parlors the next day, asking about prices and what the artists specialized in. A week later and I got a tattoo, just a few weeks before the new school year was starting.”

“I can’t even imagine how awful that must have been.”

“I got the tattoo where it is so that it’s pretty hidden day to day, and because ribcage tattoos are known to be painful. I wanted it, but I didn’t want there to be easy visibility for everyone to ask about it, and I wanted it to be painful.” Andy shrugged and wiped beneath her eyes. “Yea, so that’s why I have a teddy bear tattoo.”

It was silent for a moment, nothing save the ticking of the clock, before Nigel shifted to rest comfortably in his seat. “What was she like, Andy?” He asked. “I can’t meet her, but I’d like to know about her, if you want to share.”

Andy choked on sob, crying into Miranda’s shoulder for a few minutes before she started to talk, telling Nigel about all the things she did with her sister growing up, and how she would trade anything in the world to get a chance to see her again.

**Author's Note:**

> Please seek help if you or someone you know is considering suicide as an answer to their pain. There are a lot of resources out there now, and you deserve to get help and be safe and be here.  
> Lots of Love,  
> CBC


End file.
